Laura Veirs, Karl Blau

[KINFOLK] A thread of kinship runs through Laura Veirs’ ninth studio album. Produced by husband Tucker Martine, Warp & Weft, released in August, explores the joy and stress of being a parent, to the tune of sweeping folk and polished, family-sized country. Veirs had a second child earlier this year and, expectedly, the experience is written all over the record. Veirs said she felt an instinctive maternal fear and protectiveness while recording the album, and that is downright palpable in “Sadako Folding Cranes,” a gripping Old World ballad about the iconic young Japanese girl photographed after the bomb dropped in Hiroshima. Musically, the album saunters more than sprints, but the richness of sound achieved through a bigger band and diverse instrumentation—classical guitars, mellotrons, omnichords, various organs—creates an underlying sense of urgency. Warp & Weft is an unstoppable brushfire of refined country, and Veirs’ best work to date.